Vaughn CHL Goaltender of the Week: Kelowna’s Jordon Cooke

The Western Hockey League made it three wins in a row with the announcement that Jordon Cooke of the Kelowna Rockets had been named the Vaughn Canadian Hockey League Goaltender of the Week for the period ending on Oct. 21.

Cooke won both his starts, including a shutout, and only gave up two goals on 61 shots for a .967 save percentage to join recent WHL winners Mac Carruth of the Portland Winterhawks and Eetu Laurikainen of the Swift Current Broncos as the award winner.

Cooke, a 19-year-old from Leduc, Alberta, started his award-winning week with a 32-save shutout and First Star honours against the Prince George Cougars on Thursday, and followed that up with 27 saves and Second Star honours in a 4-2 win over Brandon.

Cookie is in his third season with the Rockets, whose goaltender coach Kim Dillibaugh also works with the Los Angeles Kings’ AHL farm team and played a big role in Jonathan Quick’s development. In 11 games, he is 5-5-1 with a .901 save percentage.

Also considered for the award this week was Matt Mahalak of the Plymouth Whalers, who posted three wins with a goals-against-average of 2.00 and save percentage of .924, while rookie Philippe Desrosiers of the Rimouski Oceanic went 1-2-0-0 with a shutout victory and a goals-against-average of 2.15 and save percentage of .935.

About The Author

Kevin Woodley is a rec-league target and former contributing editor of the Goalie News magazine. He has written about the Vancouver Canucks and NHL for The Associated Press, USA Today, Sports Illustrated and The Hockey News for the last decade, and covered the 2010 Olympics for The AP.